Zappos Blogs: geeks

Do you ever wonder what customers visiting Zappos.com think of the site and how they use it? Thankfully, we have a User Experience Research Team dedicated to answering those exact questions and more!

This team analyzes the site and its users from two different but complementary perspectives: Quantitatively and Qualitatively. The quantitative perspective tends to be data driven. They ask these types of questions: where do the website visitors come from; how many people visit the site; what do the customers do on the site; which pages are the most popular; and how many people leave the site without buying anything? Meanwhile, the qualitative perspective observes the quality of a customer’s experience by asking these questions: how are the buttons and links perceived and is it easy to use?

The team uses web analytics software, site A/B tests, surveys and user observation to obtain this information. We, then, use this information to help us decide what updates and improvements we need to make to the site.

For example, data told us that viewing larger and additional images was the most popular activity on the product page. On this version of the Product Detail Page, the customer would have to click on the product to access the multiview in a different window. However, the update embedded the multiview on the page to make viewing easier and more accessible.

To make sure customers like this update, we are currently doing a site test. Some customers get the original pop-out multiview, and other customers get the updated, embedded version of the multiview. If we find that customers viewing the new version of this page buy more products than those customers viewing the current page, then we know the new page is a success! And we’ll make the new Product Detail Page a standard feature for everyone.

Beside site tests, the Research Team also reviews 500 surveys every month. These surveys are where customers share their opinion on what works well on the site and what is confusing. The team also observes customers using the site to understand how they use the site and asks them questions regarding their experience. The motto of the Research Team is “we are not the customers”, in other words, they don’t assume, they ask.